Reaffirmation of Vehicle

[BiggRobb]

Hello All,
Filed BK 12/08, 341 Meeting held 1/6/09 deadline was 3/9/09. I'm here in CA and still awaiting discharge. I know the courts are backed up, so waiting patiently. I had two vehicles prior to filing one was repo'ed and I currently have another and keeping up with payments. I wanted to give it up but my attorney recommended I keep it. I keep reading how people can turn in the vehicle 60 days after discharge. Is this true? Has anyone done this?

[TEW]

yup as long you didn't reaffirm the loan you can call them and tell them to come pick it up. I did it after discharge

[BiggRobb]

Well the thing is a Chapter 7 Individual Debtors Statement of Intention was submitted to the courts indicating I reaffirm the debt for this vehicle, I'm I obligated to keep it? I did not sign anything with the bank. I was totally unaware of this until I started reading up on bankruptcy.

[OhioFiler]

You didn't reaffirm you merely stated your INTENDED to reaffirm. As soon as you're discharged you can let them have the vehicle with no effect on you.

[StartingOver08]

OhioF is exactly right - if you did not sign an actual reaffirmation agreement and have it filed with the court, you did not reaffirm. You would know if you signed an agreement - it is a multipage document spelling out all of the terms and conditions of your repayment plan. It is signed by you, your attorney and the lender. If your attorney would not sign it (some won't) then it must get approved by the BK court.

What you did is a ride through on your vehicle. If you want to surrender - just call the lender and make arrangements. Your personal liability has been discharged in the BK!

[pookieny]

You didn't reaffirm you merely stated your INTENDED to reaffirm. As soon as you're discharged you can let them have the vehicle with no effect on you.

But do you still need to keep your payments current?

If you're behind and are going to surrender it can they take it before your 341 or discharged?

Just wondering how long I have with my car before they come get it, I am with Wachovia.

Sorry to hijack the OP's thread.

[debtmonster]

I'm keeping my payments current on one of the two vehicles I have. I am not going to re-affirm. I plan on keeping it as long as possible until I have enough money saved up to buy a 2nd hand car for cash money. I've learned my lesson from all this. NO MORE INTEREST PAYMENTS for me after this whole bankruptcy ordeal is finished.

As I have stated in countless messages, unless you have a substantial amount of equity in the vehicle (as if you put a huge $5,000 to $10,000 down payment on it) or if the vehicle is almost paid off, I would not recommend that anyone keep their vehicles.

There are tons of $2,000 to $5,000 dollar cars that are both late models and have low miles. You don't need to buy a 150,000 mile junker after bankruptcy. There is hope after bankruptcy if you're willing to save up a little cash after you stop paying your debts.

If you need more proof of these cars, as you know, I am always happy to cite examples.

[BiggRobb]

Thats my plan debtmonster, I want to turn in vehicle and buy a second hand cash. I appreciate everyones help here. Were do you find these cars?

[debtmonster]

Thats my plan debtmonster, I want to turn in vehicle and buy a second hand cash. I appreciate everyones help here. Were do you find these cars?

I go to www.autotrader.com

Then what I will do is try to find any car (or SUV) that suits my needs.

I have my own criteria that I pick.

#1 I want nothing older than 5 to 7 years old.
#2 I want something with under 60,000 miles
#3 I will look up to 300 to 500 miles from my zip code
#4 I will cap off the money I will be able to come up with from $3,000 to $5,000.

Or if I am hurting, I'll change it to 10 years and $1500 and try to keep it under 100,000 miles. For a Honda, Acura, Lexus or Toyota, I'll allow over 100,000 miles.

If there's a good car that's 300 miles away, I'll make the 6 hour drive to go pick it up, especially if the local dealers are selling the exact same car for thousands more. Isn't it worth it to spend a 12 hour drive in a car to save a few grand?

[BiggRobb]

Cool, I'll look into and again I thank you all for the information.

[debtmonster]

Here's a real live example.

Let's say I made it past the discharge and in that time I managed to save up $2500 bucks, plus whatever money I could get from family and what not and I wanted to buy a car -TODAY- as if I were giving back my car from not re-affirming it.

Here's several cars within a decent distance from an area that are all under $2500 bucks with under 100,000 miles.

LIVE EXAMPLE

I changed the order to go from "Lowest price" to "Highest price" so that I could see the cheapest cars at the top.

I also picked "private sellers" only because lots of dealers slip in garbage cars that are either "salvage titles", "export only" or "500 down" and nonsense like that. What I wanted was a "running" car that wasn't wrecked. Something that somebody got bored with and simply wanted to dump cheap or maybe the dealer didn't want to give them anything, so they are giving it away for peanuts on Auto Trader. That's the way I look at it.

Then drive this car as long as possible until you can save up even more cash for a better car down the road. Never finance another car again as long as you live.

Credit is NOT FREE. Plus after a bankruptcy, who wants to pay this ridiculous interest rates anyway? For the money you waste on interest alone, you could have used that money to pay for repairs on a 2nd hand car.

[BiggRobb]

Good info. I'm gonna start gathering info... Thanks.

[pookieny]

Debt monster-

I have a 2005 toyota camry that I bought in 2006 for $18,300. I've paid on it for 3 years and still owe for another 3 years, $11,300. My payments are $336 and I'm thinking of surrendering it. My attorney asked if I was surrendering because he said most people do. I was going to keep it but decided to give it up. I am one month behind, almost 2. Do you know how long before they would try and grab it?

[debtmonster]

With previous repo's I was right around the 90 day mark. With my ex-wife, we had a Geo Metro and one day we woke up and it was repo'd in the night. I didn't hear a single thing.

I've over 90 days past due on my BMW and so far nobody has come looking for it. I've gotten no notices and nobody has knocked on the door. I do keep the car in the garage.

A 2005 Camry 4-cyl LE with 50,000 miles is only worth about $9200. Retail would be more. So it's a crap-shoot. If you really love the car, it's one thing, but if I owed $11k, I'd dump it and start fresh. Forget all that interest.

[pookieny]

But if I intend to surrender it when I file, isn't there some kind of automatic stay and they can't touch till the 341 meeting?

My car has 41,000 miles on it. My last payment was March 4th but that was the payment due Feb. 1